{"id":13281,"date":"2026-01-24T14:57:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T14:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldbodybuildingnews.com\/?p=13281"},"modified":"2026-01-24T14:57:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T14:57:08","slug":"from-an-eating-disorder-to-a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldbodybuildingnews.com\/?p=13281","title":{"rendered":"from an eating disorder to a"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Stav Shalom emerges from a black-and-white photograph, her body inverted on the floor, legs extended upward at a sharp angle, transparent heels pointed toward the ceiling. Her muscles are taut yet restrained, her face calm, almost indifferent to the strain her body conveys.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In another image, she stands upright, facing the camera head-on. Her gaze is steady, her muscles sharply defined, a shimmering bikini hugging her body. A heavy medal hangs from her neck. In one hand she grips a trophy, in the other a decorative sword, a theatrical prop that blurs the line between athletic competition and a mythic Amazonian figure.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Stav Shalom <\/span><\/p>\n

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In a third photograph, rendered in softer colors, she appears backstage, moments before or after stepping onto a bodybuilding stage. Her hair is rolled into curlers, her eyes cast to the side, as if briefly withdrawing from the performance itself.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A casual viewer might assume the images tell a story of strength, discipline or control, of a body meticulously built. But those familiar with the story behind them know they conceal a very different narrative: that of a young woman who suffered from eating disorders and found her way out through bodybuilding. And another story, just as central, of two sisters, one in front of the lens and the other behind it, documenting not only a body, but the difficult path that shaped it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Stav when she was a ballet dancer <\/span><\/p>\n

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Stav Shalom, 23, grew up as an outstanding ballet dancer. \u201cI was a dancer before bodybuilding,\u201d she says today. \u201cI studied at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and danced with Ballet Jerusalem, which is considered a very prestigious studio in Israel. The eating disorder developed over time. I\u2019m also, by nature, a very extreme person. The drive for perfection was always there, and ballet represents an ideal that is, in a way, impossible.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Asked when it began, she pauses. \u201cYou can\u2019t really pinpoint a single moment, because it\u2019s something that builds,\u201d she explains. \u201cIt took me a long time to understand that something was wrong with my body and my mind. It started when I realized ballet would be my life career, and I decided to give it more gas: eat \u2018clean,\u2019 train harder, put it above everything else. I prioritized it over social life and normal pleasures, like going out with friends. And suddenly the thin line between sanity and extremity grew very wide.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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What begins as a seemingly reasonable decision \u2014 eating right, training properly, putting a career first \u2014 quickly turned into the familiar and troubling chronicle of an eating disorder: a daily negotiation over the right to eat, disguised as perfectionism.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt became a fear of food,\u201d Stav says openly. \u201cFrom there it rolled into something much more emotional. If I felt I wasn\u2019t good enough at ballet, I felt I had to pay for it somehow. I felt I didn\u2019t deserve to eat. That if I lost more weight, I would look physically smaller and feel the way I already felt mentally \u2014 small.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She pauses again. \u201cOver the years it became easier for me to talk about it,\u201d she says. \u201cI didn\u2019t eat. If I did eat, I vomited, because my parents eventually became worried. People around me noticed. I hid food. The lowest weight I reached was 39 kilograms.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Eventually, it was her body that refused to keep playing along. \u201cI had a leg injury from ballet that wouldn\u2019t heal, because my body was already completely depleted,\u201d she recalls. \u201cMy father took me to the emergency room at Hadassah Hospital. They ran extensive blood tests and saw that my body was on the verge of system collapse. I was taken to the head of the psychiatric department. He asked me very personal questions, and I couldn\u2019t answer with my father in the room. It felt forbidden. Like I couldn\u2019t sit there and talk about what I was doing under my family\u2019s nose. They asked my father to leave the room, and I told them everything. They said either I enter day hospitalization or I would be forcibly hospitalized.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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From Hadassah she was referred to her health fund\u2019s mental health center: psychologist, nutritionist, weigh-ins. \u201cHonestly? It didn\u2019t really help,\u201d she says bluntly. \u201cI tried, but mentally I was so locked in, and I loved that voice in my head that told me, \u2018You\u2019re not enough.\u2019 I believed it.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Then came 2020. The pandemic shut everything down, and paradoxically, that was when something shifted. \u201cEverything stopped because of COVID. No one knew how to deal with it, and it affected my treatment too,\u201d she says. \u201cSuddenly your routine collapses. You sleep all day, your nights flip. It was harder for my family to watch over me. And at some point I realized I actually had something to lose in life.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Friends began reconnecting over FaceTime. \u201cYou remember people from the past. I had cut myself off from everyone and was stuck in this lonely loop. I missed being happy, social, doing things an 18-year-old girl does. Slowly, very carefully, I started eating again. It was terrifying. I relapsed more than once. But gradually I understood that I wanted to live \u2014 and if I didn\u2019t choose that for myself, I wouldn\u2019t listen to anyone else.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Recovery was not linear. She later moved to Germany and returned to dancing. \u201cThe trigger came back, but I had a framework and could ask for help, because I genuinely wanted to stay happy and deal with it,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen people asked how I felt, I\u2019d say I felt like I was in the middle of a vast ocean, constantly swimming just to keep my head above water. Slowly, the water gets shallower. You can put your feet down. You don\u2019t have to fight just to survive.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Eventually, she returned to Israel \u2014 and decided to quit ballet for good. \u201cMost dancers retire young, and many gain weight very fast. I saw it around me. I didn\u2019t want that to happen.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She joined a gym. \u201cI thought it would fill the void. I got addicted very fast,\u201d she says. Within a year she was training intensely and began working with a coach who competed in bodybuilding. A casual comment \u2014 \u201cIf you were wearing a bikini, you\u2019d win\u201d \u2014 changed everything.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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At 22, she signed up for her first competition. She won. Then she won again. \u201cThat\u2019s when I realized I was meant for this,\u201d she says. \u201cI know how to handle it. It\u2019s healthy for me.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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At this point, her sister Ofek, 27, joins the conversation. A photographer and Bezalel graduate, she documented the journey in an intimate project titled \u201cMiss Bikini.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI started the project as a final-year assignment,\u201d Ofek says. \u201cI was interested in the transition from the extreme femininity of ballet to the extreme masculinity of bodybuilding. The dissonance is enormous.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The project began on competition day itself. \u201cI followed Stav from morning until night with a small analog camera and direct flash,\u201d Ofek says. \u201cI felt like I was entering her world, seeing how she sees it. And it became a shared journey \u2014 not just photographer and subject, but sisters. When she had an eating disorder, I lived it too, from the side.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The project quickly moved beyond the personal. It was published in a Jerusalem-based magazine, later in Haaretz, and eventually exhibited in Israel\u2019s \u201cLocal Testimony\u201d photography exhibition.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI was nervous seeing my image displayed so large,\u201d Stav says. \u201cThese weren\u2019t stage photos at my peak condition. I was heavier, less defined. But I\u2019m in such a healthy place now that I feel proud. I\u2019m proud of the process.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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For both sisters, bodybuilding became a lens through which recovery could be explored without reducing the story to illness alone. \u201cPeople think bodybuilding is shallow,\u201d Stav says. \u201cIt\u2019s not just putting on a bikini and showing your body on stage. It\u2019s an intense mental game. The stage is 10 minutes. The journey is life-changing.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Her journey now continues offstage, training others \u2014 including women who come to her because they know her story.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI weighed 39 kilos at my lowest. Today I weigh nearly 55. I\u2019ve never been this weight in my life,\u201d she says. \u201cFood is fuel now. A place to grow. And I\u2019m happier than I\u2019ve ever been.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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One photograph from \u201cMiss Bikini\u201d is currently on display at the \u201cLocal Testimony\u201d exhibition at the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel Aviv, through January 31.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n